THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 19, 1996 TAG: 9610170246
SECTION: REAL ESTATE WEEKLY PAGE: 03 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY CHRIS KIDDER, SPECIAL TO REAL ESTATE WEEKLY
LENGTH: 170 lines
If it weren't for the green highway signs welcoming Virginians to North Carolina, few would know where one state ends and the other begins.
Flat coastal farms give way to stands of sycamore, sweet gum, cypress and hickory. Tidewater rivers and creeks flow across the border and the Great Dismal Swamp pays no mind to the manmade boundary.
But home buyers have discovered that moving across the line to North Carolina means more than just a change of address: Buying power increases because the land is cheaper (the cost to build a house is about the same) and property tax bills take a nose dive.
It's not just a matter of money, say folks who've made the move. Crime rates are lower, schools are better by many standards, and rural Tar Heel Tidewater has a laid-back appeal no longer found in the incorporated cities north of the state line.
Nancy Bass and her family moved from Virginia to Quail Run, a large subdivision of middle income homes, in Moyock nine years ago. She says that 80 or 90 percent of her neighbors are Virginia commuters.
Now a real estate agent with Realty Executives, Chesapeake, Bass is licensed to sell in both states. Working from personal experience, she specializes in helping people make the transition from Virginian to Tar Heel.
Summer traffic to the Outer Banks on Routes 17 and 158 - the major thoroughfares between coastal North Carolina and Virginia - concerns some potential home buyers, she says. The drive to major chain food, drug and retail shopping is another consideration.
But, for most, getting away from all the things they dislike about living in the city overrides the inconveniences.
Bass says she shopped all over Tidewater before building a home in Moyock. She was able to build the house she wanted on a full acre of land and pay $10,000 less than she would have paid to build the same house on a quarter-acre in Chesapeake.
When the annual property tax savings were figured in, it was a bargain she couldn't pass up. Taxes are one of the most frequently cited reasons for making the move, say real estate agents who work the border. ``Whenever the tax bills go out in the Virginia area, we get a lot of calls,'' says Bass.
Currituck County residents in the Moyock area pay 73.5 cents per $100 of assessed property value. Property taxes in bordering Virginia cities average $4 per $100. Taxes on a Virginia Beach house valued at $100,000 would exceed $4,000 each year; Currituck County would collect only $735 on the same house in Moyock.
While the border at Moyock is well marked with more than highway signs - Southland pushes cigarettes and barbecue on the North Carolina side, the Virginia lottery is the vice du jour at the 7-Eleven across the line - there's no such division on Knotts Island, where one state slips quietly into the other amid the marshes and strawberry fields.
In fact, the island isn't an island at all, but an appendage to the south side of Virginia Beach separating Back Bay from the Currituck Sound. It is cut off from the North Carolina mainland on the west by the North Landing River.
Knotts Island is so separated from the rest of North Carolina that the only direct connection is a 45-minute ferry ride to Currituck, the tiny, rural county seat on the mainland. Urban Virginia, on the other hand, is just up the road.
Carol Webb, an agent with Long & Foster, a Virginia real estate company that handles border properties in both states, lives in Back Bay, just beyond the northwest end of Knotts Island. Early weekday mornings, she watches a solid stream of cars leaving the island for work in Virginia.
Knotts Island may not be a true island but its isolation and maritime climate fosters an island mentality. ``People are willing to drive anywhere to work if they can live on Knotts Island'', says Webb. ``There's a thundering herd of people who are trying to move down there.''
One drawback to the island for many families, says Webb, is the inaccessibility of Currituck County's schools: Students have to ride the ferry each day to the mainland.
And the only other drawback, says Webb, is that developed property for sale on Knotts Island is scarce. ``People are desperate to get their hands on something,'' she says.
The last house Webb listed on the island was bought by a neighbor ``the minute I put the sign up,'' she says. Another property, a less than desirable fixer-upper without water frontage, sold in three months for just under $100,000. She didn't know of any Knotts Island homes currently on the market.
There are only a few subdivisions being developed on Knotts Island. Even though prices are excellent - large waterfront lots start around $45,000 - many cash-conscious commuters don't want the headaches and uncertainties of building a new house, Webb says.
``I wish I had an excuse to live down there,'' says Webb. ``It's God's country.''
Others consider South Mills, straddling the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway just off U.S. Highway 17 in Camden County, a pastoral heaven. Thirty minutes south of Portsmouth, 10 minutes from Elizabeth City, N.C., the village combines rural ambience with good schools and an abundance of undeveloped land.
``There are a lot of beautiful building sites,'' says Town & County Realty Group agent Terry Saunders. ``People want the more country-type environment. They want to get out of the hustle and bustle.''
Saunders predicts that Virginians will buy more than half the lots in McPherson Estates, a new subdivision she listed near South Mills about seven months ago.
There's little wonder: Where else within easy driving of Tidewater can you buy a heavily wooded, near-acre lot with underground utilities, a public water system and restrictive covenants for $18,000 and pay a property tax rate of only 80 cents per $100?
For many home buyers, sales are clinched by the fact that Camden County schools outscored almost all the competition in North Carolina and Virginia on the national Scholastic Achievement Tests last year.
``I'm surprised McPherson Estates hasn't sold faster,'' says Saunders.
South Mills may be a little far from the border for Virginia commuters making their first move into Tar Heel territory. Agents agree that first-time buyers are reluctant to stray too far from the border. ``The closer to the line the better,'' says Town & Country Realty Group agent Jim Gibbons.
That's why Brian Inness, owner of Scot Realty and Construction, Moyock, isn't surprised when the houses he's built on Tulls Creek Road, just a couple miles south of the Virginia line, sell quickly.
His latest house - a three bedroom, two-bath, 1,460 square-foot, energy-efficient home on more than a half-acre of land - lists for $113,200. ``The same house would cost about $150,000 in Virginia,'' he explains.
But the demand for property farther south is growing as subdivisions closer to the border sell out and become more urban. People want to get away from the heavily populated areas and that now includes the Currituck County-Virginia line in some places, says Yvonne Parks, owner of Providence Real Estate, Elizabeth City.
Communities like Grandy, Bells Island and Powells Point are no longer considered outside a commuter's driving range, says Parks. The Elizabeth City area - not much closer to the Virginia line - already has more than 10,000 residents who commute to Virginia.
Inness agrees. He opened an office in Grandy, halfway to the beach, and is marketing a new golf course community there to Virginians. With a four-lane highway all the way to the Virginia border coming in the very near future, says Inness, ``Grandy is a lot nearer time-wise than it use to be.''
Most Virginians who make the move south can identify with Linda and ``Greg'' Gregory who moved to Currituck County four years ago from Virginia Beach. The Gregorys find themselves crisscrossing the border to take care of Greg's real estate business at Hall & Nixon's Moyock office and family needs.
``But we don't mind,'' says Linda. ``It's worth it to live here.''
Few would say the move to North Carolina was life-changing. Like most of life's boundaries, the line between Virginia and North Carolina is as much a state of mind as anything else.
And for those who cross the border to live, the change is a subtle shift in style, reflected in the open spaces, the neighborly folks and a bit more money in the pocket. ILLUSTRATION: [Cover, Color photo]
CHRIS KIDDER
The Virginian-Pilot
[Color Photos]
CHRIS KIDDER
More and more former Virginians commute daily from subdivisions such
as Duck Ridge near Moyock, N.C.
Moyock Meadows features cheaper land and lower taxes, a big lure
just across the line.
Photo by CHRIS KIDDER
Houses line the banks of the Dismal Swamp Canal, part of the
Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, in South Mills, N.C., a commuter
"border town." by CNB